Terrance Osborne Illuminates Congo Square: Highly acclaimed New Orleans artist at Jazz Fest 2007
The 38th annual New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival kicks off the last week of April with arts and crafts, great food, and music headliners, including Norah Jones, Jerry Lee Lewis, Irma Thomas, Ellis Marsalis, Doctor John, Richie Havens, Percy Sledge, Steve Marley and Zachary Richard. During the festival, hundreds of musicians will be entertaining the crowds, and Harry Connick, Jr. is slated to close out the event on Sunday, May 6 on the Acura stage.
Two pieces of collectible art marks each year’s celebration: the Jazz Fest poster, and the Congo Square poster. Jazz Fest’s posters are legendary, and highly sought after. The Jazz Fest poster this year is energized by a portrait of Jerry Lee Lewis, by Lafayette artist Francis Pavy. The official Congo Square poster fairly bursts with the likeness of Phillip Frazer, tuba player and leader of the Rebirth Brass Band, by Terrance Osborne, a perennial standout in the festival’s Congo Square African Marketplace.
Festivalgoers should stop by and meet Osborne at Congo Square, where they can experience music and art from Africa and the African Diaspora. On the stage African, African-American, Afro-Caribbean and Latino musicians perform. The Congo Square Marketplace features original paintings, sculpture, clothing, jewelry, musical instruments, and an array of handcrafted artworks. Osborne will be displaying his art there during the first weekend of Jazz Fest. “I’m going to bring all of my new work and some of my old work as well,” Osborne advises. “Everything I sell on my website will be at the Jazz Festival. I am also going to have 100 remarked artist’s proofs of the Congo Square poster, but they won’t be available until after Jazz Festival. You can’t get them anywhere else,” he explains. “The posters are doing very well; people have been pre-ordering them.”
Osborne, 32, is a Xavier University graduate, known for his brightly colored paintings of dizzily distorted New Orleans architecture. He rose to fame in 2004 when he was commissioned to paint a large mural depicting a Crescent Cityscape on the outdoor wall of the Hilton New Orleans Riverside hotel. Osborne, together with his wife and three children evacuated for Katrina and now reside in Georgia, but are returning this summer.
Osborne has been exhibiting his work in Congo Square since 1998. He has won consecutive awards for Best Vendor, Most Unique Artwork and the Best of Show Award two years in a row. The Congo Square poster celebrates the Afro-Caribbean aspects of New Orleans’ heritage; Osborne has long sought the lucrative poster commission. His vibrant Congo Square poster is an inspired rendition of Phillip Frazer and his tuba. The beloved Rebirth Jazz Band is a fitting subject of the painting, because “rebirth” is at the core of how New Orleans residents feel about rebuilding their great city.
The New Orleans artist estimates the number of 2007 prints will be “around six thousand,” compared to roughly five thousand in past years. Fans of Osborne’s energetic style will experience something new with the more realistic Congo Square poster. A photo of Frazer taken by former Saints football player Brad Edelman inspired Osborne. To it, he added one he had snapped, plus his glowing rainbow palette, with rooftops rendered in his trademark style at the edges of the print.
Osborne is also producing the awards that represent the Best in Show for Congo Square vendors. In the past couple of years, Osborne himself has received numerous kudos: in 2006, he was named one of New Orleans Magazine’s 50 People to Watch; 2004 Where Magazine’s Best Architectural Artist and the prestigious “40 Under 40” award for both Gambit Weekly and City Business. His work has been displayed on the set of MTV’s Real World New Orleans. In 2004, he was commissioned by the Lt. Governor’s office to produce the official state certificate.
Osborne taught in New Orleans for five years prior to Katrina. “I was making more money at my art than from my teaching. Stephanie believed I could make it on my art alone. So when we got to Atlanta after our home flooded in Katrina, she said I didn’t need to look for a job. I started painting full time and it has worked very well.” Osborne and his wife Stephanie run a virtual gallery at www.galleryosborne.com “My wife handles the business side,” admits Osborne. “She actually comes up with the ideas. For instance, the Hilton was her proposal. She also did the Jazz Festival proposal to Art4Now. It was her idea to do that. I don’t know what I would do without her. She is always thinking of ways to take my career to the next level. Also, since I have been advertising in Louisiana Homes & Gardens magazine, my sales have increased 50-60 percent.”
Osborne paints what he himself would like to see as a spectator. “I like for my viewers to be overwhelmed when they look at my color. I do paintings so that they have an almost edible appearance to them. I am trying to find a certain language with my painting. That language might be screaming at the time.”
The 2007 Congo Square poster is a departure from Osborne’s norm. “At the outset, my intention was to produce a winner and I believe I did that. This piece isn’t as consistent with how my work usually looks. It has a different energy but with its vivid color and form, it is recognizably an Osborne.” Typically, his paintings express architecture as a jazzy visual lyric. “I give . . . energy to the houses. They almost look like a person,” he states. “I also turn the lights on inside, even if the house is submerged in water. It gives life to it, while adding a silver lining. Even though the storm has destroyed a city, it hasn’t destroyed the life in it.” Thank you, Terrance Osborne for incorporating vibrant colors and a whimsical perspective into the unique spirit of the place we love and live. ✦
